Santogold - Contributed 'I grew up listening to different types of music. I grew up listening to reggae and old soul like Aretha and Marvin Gaye, Nina Simone and The Temptations.'
Santogold is the best thing to happen to music for a long time.
Normally when you say that about an artiste who is about to release her debut album, you're only talking about one - or at best two - genres of music.
Well, Santogold is really and truly good enough to have an effect on the world of both popular and underground music in a way few have managed before.
Of all the fresh and new genre- bending artistes who have made noise so far in 2008, she is by far the best, and most accomplished. And let's be real; while she will be eternally compared to M.I.A (at least in the United Kingdom), she is a far better songwriter and has much more stock in the game.
Like all the best artistes, most people probably know Santogold's music without even knowing it. The first port of call is Res' 2002 debut album How I Do, which established the New York-based singer as the alternative black female artiste du jour.
similar singing styles
Is it a testament to Santogold's talent that Res is yet to release another album? You can definitely hear some similar singing styles that Santogold gave Res on the self-titled Santogold album. I'm A Lady, in particular, sounds like it could have been written by Santi for Res. And certain parts of her hit single, L. E. S. Artistes, seem to recall some of the vocal stylings heard on songs like They Say Vision and Ice King.
She's even written a song for Jessica Simpson's little sister, Ashlee. The Timbaland produced Out Of My Head is easily identifiable as a Santi White creation.
informercial
"It's a nickname I've had since I was a kid," she says on how Santi White became Santogold. "There was an infomercial that used to come on that used to sell all this big gold, all this cheap gold jewellery, and I used to wear fake earrings when I was like 12. Everyone was like 'Santogold, Santogold' and that was it."
But while the alternative pop rock of L.E.S. Artistes perhaps provides the truest glimpse of Santogold after writing How I Do, she fronted punk band Stiffed for a hot minute, it is Creator, which has perhaps caused the most excitement outside of the rock world.
On the road and in the clubs, that is the tune that has been causing a fuss. No grime emcees have freestyled over the instrumental to L.E.S. Artistes. But the frenetic Freq Nasty and Switch-produced Creator, which you should have heard on the new V05 advert, are getting much love on radio and mixtapes.
But Santogold is much more than that. Songs like My Superman, Starstruck and Unstoppable are pretty much her own genre.
turned on to classic rock
"I grew up listening to a lot of different types of music," she understates. "I grew up listening to reggae and old soul like Aretha and Marvin Gaye, Nina Simone and The Temptations and then my sister turned me on to classic rock like Zeppelin and Hendrix and then punk rock like Bad Brains and Suicidal Tendencies, Fun Boy 3 and The Smiths. And this is by age 11. Then I got into hip-hop like Salt'N'Pepa and all that kind of stuff that was out at the same time."
"That's how I grew up. That was my musical environment. And as I got into music, they were all of the different things I was drawing from. And with this record I wasn't gonna minimise myself, I was gonna fully represent myself. I just let it all come out."
Everybody wants a piece of Santogold right now. But she doesn't seem overly bothered. Not even by the fact that the great Common wants to collaborate on a forthcoming tune that's supposed to be called Runaway.
She sounded surprised, saying, "He said that's what it's called? He sent me a track and I'm supposed to be writing to it. But I don't know when that's gonna happen. His deadline is like yesterday."
Santogold is out on Lizard King/Atlantic Records.
